Ships sinking time (GWX)

[Shadowblade]

Hi,
what is max. sinking time in GWX (still playing GWX 2.1 career) ? How long should I wait before firing next eel into crippled ship, when I have safe position (no DDs around) and I cant use deckgun for coup de grâce (warship, armed merchant).

thnx

[melnibonian]

There is no such thing as maximum sinking time. Ships accumulate damage as they are hit and flood. If the flooding is controled then they need to be hit again. If not then eventually they will sink.

[Shadowblade]

ok, I rather mean recorded (in GWX) sinking times - my max. sinking time is 2h 30min (Modern Tanker, 1 impact torpedo) so far. Has anyone higher sinking times ?

[Jimbuna]

Sinking times vary considerablt depending on the number of areas that are holed and the percentage of damage caused in each.

In game terms 4 hours can elapse quite regularly in my experience.

[Platapus]

When in doubt give em another eel!

[Shadowblade]

When in doubt give em another eel!

well, I dont want to waste my eels when flooding can do the rest of work. ;)

Last time I was shadowing severely wounded Southampton cruiser (1 torpedo hit, speed decresed to about 1 knot, lifeboat in water, heavily listed - I didnt know how such listed ship could still move, but her remaining crew managed to control the flooding) for 24 hrs before I finished her with one of my last internal torpedoes. Cruiser sank after explosions of ammo bunkers.

[lostsm]

i'm submerged near a small merchant i hit with the IIA, and it's been over 12 hours on TC 1024, and it still hasn't sunk.

i hit it in the keel, then with some flak to blow up the cargo and life boat. right now the small merchant has a fire, is going 0 knots but doesn't seem to be losing height (listing?)

not sure what i did wrong, but with my limited amount of torpedoes i don't know if those 2k tons is worth another shot when i can be lucky and sink a 10k tons with one torp

[Pablo]

Hi!

Your 20mm flak won't do much good against a ship, even if you expend your entire ammo load near the waterline. Your best bet is probably to go ahead and sink the crippled ship with a torpedo and then go hunt for more ships. When you run out, just run back to port, reload, and head out again.

Pablo

[lostsm]

yeah i noticed the flak isn't much:DL but its fun to blow up the cargo containers, and at least fishing boats can be sunk with it, which sink very fast.

since i posted in this thread i came upon 2 medium cargo ships that both took (what seemed to be forever) a long time to sink. the irony :wah:

i'm using gwx 3 and having my weps guy target, this time both was aimed at the fuel bunkers and it was in very calm waters

[RoaldLarsen]

Hi!

Your 20mm flak won't do much good against a ship, even if you expend your entire ammo load near the waterline. Your best bet is probably to go ahead and sink the crippled ship with a torpedo and then go hunt for more ships. When you run out, just run back to port, reload, and head out again.

Pablo

Yes, the game doesn't seem to model much (if any) damage by 20mm flak against steel hulls. In reality, those 20mm guns could pierce the hulls of the average ship. I seem to remember reading about one famous u-boat captain finishing off a victim with the 20mm.

[Lt.Fillipidis]

I seem to remember reading about one famous u-boat captain finishing off a victim with the 20mm.
I would be intrested in that story.

Usually, before the merchants got deck guns, i fired the flak on light ships but i can confirm it. Very limited damage from the 20mm.

[melnibonian]

I seem to remember reading about one famous u-boat captain finishing off a victim with the 20mm.

You're talking about Wolfgang Lüth. It is true that he did used 20mm rounds to sink a ship, but there are a few other things to consider in this story.

1. The Empire Whimbrel was already hit by torpedoes and received hits by the deck gun rounds as well. http://www.uboat.net/allies/merchants/2859.html

2. The Notre Dame du Châtelet (I think this is the ship you're talking about) was a small wooden sailing ship of 488 tons, but still in order to be sunk rounds from both deck gun and AA guns (20mm) were required http://www.uboat.net/allies/merchants/ships/923.html

I hope this is useful to clear why 20mm rounds cannot (alone) sink a ship.

[meduza]

In game it is possible to sink small merchants and similar ships with 20mm. I did it once or twice. Takes a lot of time and ammo....

[Shadowblade]

I have also few questions about deck gun and flak:

1) can light/heavy flak cause flooding with hits under waterline or there is counted only basic damage of flak round?

2) can light/heavy flak destroy less armored weapons and damage "weak spots" of ship ?

3) have fires on ship's deck and destruction of its cargo and destructible parts (stacks, masts, ...) any effects on ship under fire (Hp loss) ? Community manual recommends aim on cargo (for faster sinking), but I have certain results only with destroyed weapons and searchlights...

4) are there any different attributes between floating docks ? It seems that floating dock in Dover is "more" resistant to deckgun fire (105 mm), last time it absorbed several tens of hits and started smoking only - I couldnt sink it with my deckgun. Similiar floating dock in Scapa Flow was sunk after 5-6 hits. Both docks are type with 33 200 tons and can be destroyed with single torpedo, I was aiming for dock's waterline...

5) In SH3 we can manage only the torpedo loadout. What was situation with managing the ammo for deckgun(s) and flak on uboats, was real Kaleun (or his trusted officer) able to affect quantity and composition (AA/AP) of loaded ammo ?

[WilyPete]

I hit a ship with 3 eels (though 1 may have detonated prematurely) and it didn't sink for over 48 hours. It was listing to port and the stern was submerged under water and she was stationary in the water. 1 eel hit in the engine room and the other astern, it was a approx a 4500 ton merchant. Seeing it was getting beyond riduclous and I had no more eels left (IIa) I decided to fire all my 20cm flak rounds at it. Well, the cargo exploded but nothing much else. So on the third day I left it and returned to base. I have to add that the sea was dead calm...that probably didn't help either as even the smallest waves would've brought her under.

As for 20cm flak ever having sunk a merchant ship, I have managed it only once. Was one of the really small merchants. It was hit with 1 torpedo if I remember correctly and was just dead in the water without listing. I fired the flax and after the cargo exploded and secondary explosions too and then there was an almighty explosion and the thing just broke in two. I'm sure it was the flak as it was so different from the effects the eels have. :up:

[WilyPete]

I have also few questions about deck gun and flak:

5) In SH3 we can manage only the torpedo loadout. What was situation with managing the ammo for deckgun(s) and flak on uboats, was real Kaleun (or his trusted officer) able to affect quantity and composition (AA/AP) of loaded ammo ?

I can only answer this one with any certainty. As far as I'm aware: NO. People who've never experienced the military tend to have misconceptions where commanders can basically do what they want. They can't. They still work within the paramaters of protocol which is decided by the brass in some office. Like in SH3 we decide how many G7a or G7e we bring along at the start of the war, say. This wouldn't be the case...at the most you'd have the base commander putting out a directive of the quota of any new equipment allowed per boat. Then of course, a wink-wink nudge-nudge to the warrant officer engineers would get you more depending on how friendly your relationship is between you 2.

So no...you'd have quotas and directives and you'd have to work within those parameters. Military forces don't change much...they pretty much work on tradition. Hence why I'm pretty certain... Just to say the armed forces I was in was a member of the Axis during WW2 and even though they "lost" and were the "bad guys", the uniforms, units, insignia, tradition etc etc have not changed much if at all, even though to an outsider it would seem not politically correct. IN fact some of you would've been very much shocked, I'm sure. Even the unit's Gold Medal for valour won at Tobruk fighting the British was very much celebrated. ;)

[Akmatov]

Just to chime in with Wily Pete, the old East German Army uniforms, as far as I could tell, were basically the old Wehrmacht uniforms with a new helmet - was really startling the first time I happened to see them in a parade.

And as far as I know, the old Bundeswehr uniform, no idea what they are wearing these days, was purposely designed to be impossible to press and make look spiffy.

And as far as the Gold Medal for valour won at Tobruk, that is a reflection of the valour of the unit's previous soldiers, not a comment on the identity of the opposition.

The military is an odd and different subset of society. :)